Oregon Court of Appeals overturns conviction of a Black man who has been on death row for 17 years
CNN
The Oregon Court of Appeals has reversed the aggravated murder conviction of a Black man who has been on death row for 17 years. The court said Jesse Lee Johnson did not receive an adequate defense.
Johnson was convicted in 2004 of stabbing Harriet Thompson to death at her home in 1998. But attorneys representing him after the conviction discovered that a neighbor, Patricia Hubbard, living across the street from the victim said she had seen a White man enter the house around the time of the killing.
However, police did not interview this witness, and neither did the attorneys who were representing Johnson at his trial. The appeals court said this was a critical error that could have affected the case.
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